I feel like i am stuck in a loop, I see a lot of folks struck in this as well, I started a freelancing account on upwork/freelancer/similar site, a year or two later, I have an established profile, I want to build a company instead of getting gigs as an individual (because of the securtiy net / the prospect of getting paid even when i can't work etc). But the gigs I have as yet, don't convert as they insist I be the one to write the code instead of someone I hire. Any advice on people who have been through this problem? how should i address it?
Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
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Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#2You're going to find that your abilities don't scale - the people who do what you do as well as you need them to to be able to provide good service cost too much for you to effectively arbitrage their labor.
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#3You're going to find that your abilities don't scale - the people who do what you do as well as you need them to to be able to provide good service cost too much for you to effectively arbitrage their labor.
That is patently untrue. Otherwise, agencies wouldn't exist.
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#4You're going to find that your abilities don't scale - the people who do what you do as well as you need them to to be able to provide good service cost too much for you to effectively arbitrage their labor.
That is patently untrue. Otherwise, agencies wouldn't exist.
Agencies have no understanding of how to estimate a software project, and arbitrage underpaying moderately skilled workers who don't know any better working 50-60 hour weeks to compensate for bad schedules and lowballed estimates. I've never worked at an agency where a 40 hour week was remotely the norm.
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#5You're going to find that your abilities don't scale - the people who do what you do as well as you need them to to be able to provide good service cost too much for you to effectively arbitrage their labor.
That is patently untrue. Otherwise, agencies wouldn't exist.
In my experience and close friends, the agencies hire consultants to do the difficult work, and are not good at managing that more difficult work.
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#6You're going to find that your abilities don't scale - the people who do what you do as well as you need them to to be able to provide good service cost too much for you to effectively arbitrage their labor.
True, but making a good process to replicate it further can scale
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#7You're going to find that your abilities don't scale - the people who do what you do as well as you need them to to be able to provide good service cost too much for you to effectively arbitrage their labor.
True, but making a good process to replicate it further can scale
I speak from experience - you can leverage the cooperation of 3-4 successful consultants to fill gaps or land larger projects, but you'll make more money consulting than you ever will trying to make your process scale.
The only exception is if you target a repeatable market for business processes.
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#8Earlier quoted context omitted.
True, but making a good process to replicate it further can scale
I speak from experience - you can leverage the cooperation of 3-4 successful consultants to fill gaps or land larger projects, but you'll make more money consulting than you ever will trying to make your process scale. The only exception is if you target a repeatable market for business processes.
Why does this have to be?
If you pay the good consultants what they are worth, and then pass on the cost of them + an appropriate cost for leading the project(s) + your consulting fee for working within the project, you should make more than consulting alone, no?
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#9First, let me disclaim IANAL.
Depending on the wording in your SoW/contract (You DO have a written contract, right??) you may not have to disclose that someone else working for you are doing the customer work.
It may also depend on the structure of your business. I'd talk to a lawyer about it. I am in the same boat as you, and I formed as an LLC, so I've been working on getting other work that I can sub out.
Re: Ask HN: Evolving from freelancing gigs to a consulting company?
#10How about charging more for your service so it's more worth your time to write the code?
Also, I can recommend reading this blog post series on consulting for general advice:
https://kirubakaran.com/blog/consulting-outline/
As for creating a contracting agency, it becomes about sales and marketing. You can market yourself as a premium dev shop if you find other senior programmers to work with you. You have to get good at reaching out to companies and offering them your services. Upwork isn't a good place for that imo, but you could think of Upwork as just another channel for your sales funnel.